Martin Luther King Born:January 15, 1929 Died: April 4, 1968 Category: Leader and pacifist Introduction: Martin Luther King was an American activist and leader in the African American civil rights movement. He was born in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1929. His minister father combined religion with a sense of social justice. Throughout the southern states in the US, racial segregation was the law- black people were not allowed to go to the same school, live in the same neighborhoods, or even drink from the same water fountains as whites. His loving family protected young Martin from some kinds of racism, and made sure he knew his worth. Still, Martin grew up thinking the worst of whites and it wasn’t until he went to university in the North that he realized that the southern racism was kept alive by its unjust laws which must be changed. For the next thirteen years, King and others led people across the south, and then across the nation, in non-violent boycotts, sit-ins, marches and demonstrations. As the civil rights movement spread, King raised the hopes and pride of black people. Explanation: Martin Luther King, Junior, was the hero of a civil rights movement in the USA. He led many thousands of people in non-violent protests and resistance against racial discrimination. He raised black people’s sense of pride while appealing to the goodness and sense of justice that all people share. He paved the way so that ordinary American citizens did not have to go the extra mile to receive the rights that the 14th amendment had already given them. Martin Luther is known as a hero worldwide for his work to end racial segregation and for using the non-violent techniques taught by Gandhi. His eloquent speeches moved both black and white people to join the crusade for civil rights. Together, they faced not only arrest but bombings, shootings, lynchings and beatings by those opposed to integration. Despite such obstacles, blacks still managed to improve their lives and work for change. Martin King, Junior, was part of a rising generation that was better off and better educated. His father had gone from penniless sharecropper’s son to well-educated minister through his own efforts. People like King felt an ever better world was possible for their children, and they were willing to give their lives for that vision. In 1964, the US Congress passed strong civil rights laws and started to enforce them. Meanwhile, King looked for causes of black powerlessness and poverty. He campaigned for equal education and job opportunities, registration voters, and for a sense of black community pride. He travelled tirelessly, working twenty hours a day, seven days a week. Always a target for hatred, King was assassinated in 1968. His death seemed like a victory for violence, especially when blacks reacted by rioting in several cities. But King never flinched from the violence he knew lay in everyone, black and white. His dream did not die with him, and today people continue working to realize the community he dreamt of. As the years passed from the 1950’s to the 1960’s, King’s philosophy was often attacked by extremists, who either thought he was pushing ahead too fast or not fast enough. It took all of his courage to stand clearly behind the principles of love and non-violence. He often reminded his supporters not to hate other people, but only wrong their actions. He firmly believed that all people had goodness in them, and that it could be awakened by taking on their fear and hatred without giving in to it oneself. His philosophy and commitment earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964. At thirty-five, he was the youngest person to ever receive it. This is why I believe that Martin Luther King is the most influential and significant historical figure in the world. Quote: ‘Being a Negro in America means trying to smile when you want to cry. It means trying to hold on to physical life amid psychological death. It means the pain of watching your children grow up with clouds of inferiority in their mental skies. It means having your legs cut off, and then being condemned for being a cripple. It means seeing your mother and father spiritually murdered by the slings and arrows of daily exploitation, and then being hated for being an orphan’ Artifact:
The Penn Center, an African American cultural centre. Image:
http://www.africawithin.com/mlking/mlk.jpg
Historical perspectives: Many sources reveal the faults and weaknesses of Martin Luther King. One of King’s closest friends, Rev. Ralph Abernathy, wrote a book in 1989 in which he talked about King’s obsession with white prostitutes. King would often use church donations to have drunken sex parties, where he would hire two to three white prostitutes, occasionally beating them brutally. This has also been reported by the FBI agents who monitored King. He was married and had four children while he did this. Other then the allegations of adultery, there were claims that King had communist connections. In 1962, FBI investigators learned that one of King’s most trusted advisers was New York City lawyer Stanley Levison who had been actively involved with the Communist Party USA. Levison’s influence on King was feared and in 1963, another King Lieutenant, Hunter Pitts O’Dell, was also linked to the Communist Party. At the time of Martin Luther King, American was deeply entrenched in racism and intolerance of Negroes, especially in the deep southern states. Hatred of King rose from a hatred of African Americans and the perspective of many was that a black man like King should not obtain the power that he did. Timeline:
1929
Born on at noon on January 15, 1929.
Parents: The Reverend and Mrs. Martin Luther King, Sr.
Home: 501 Auburn Avenue, N.E., Atlanta, Georgia.
1944
Graduated from Booker T. Washington High School and was admitted to Morehouse College at age 15.
1948
Graduates from Morehouse College and enters Crozer Theological Seminary.
Ordained to the Baptist ministry, February 25, 1948, at age 19.
Marries Coretta Scott and settles in Montgomery, Alabama.
1955
Received Doctorate of Philosophy in Systematic Theology from Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts on June 5, 1955.
Dissertation Title: A Comparison of God in the Thinking of Paul Tillich and Henry Wiseman.
Joins the bus boycott after Rosa Parks was arrested on December 1. On December 5, he is elected president of the Montgomery Improvement Association, making him the official spokesman for the boycott.
1956
On November 13, the Supreme Court rules that bus segregation is illegal, ensuring victory for the boycott.
1957
King forms the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to fight segregation and achieve civil rights. On May 17, Dr. King speaks to a crowd of 15,000 in Washington, D.C.
1958
The U.S. Congress passed the first Civil Rights Act since reconstruction. King's first book, Stride Toward Freedom, is published.
On a speaking tour, Martin Luther King, Jr. is nearly killed when stabbed by an assailant in Harlem. Met with President Dwight D. Eisenhower, along with Roy Wilkins, A. Philip Randolph, and Lester Grange on problems affecting black Americans.
1959
Visited India to study Mohandas Gandhi's philosophy of nonviolence.
Resigns from pastoring the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church to concentrate on civil rights full time. He moved to Atlanta to direct the activities of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
1960
Becomes co-pastor with his father at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia.
Lunch counter sit-ins began in Greensboro, North Carolina. In Atlanta, King is arrested during a sit-in waiting to be served at a restaurant. He is sentenced to four months in jail, but after intervention by John Kennedy and Robert Kennedy, he is released.
Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee founded to coordinate protests at Shaw University, Raleigh, North Carolina.
1961
In November, the Interstate Commerce Commission bans segregation in interstate travel due to work of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Freedom Riders.
Congress on Racial Equality (CORE) began first Freedom Ride through the South, in a Greyhound bus, after the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed segregation in interstate transportation.
1962
During the unsuccessful Albany, Georgia movement, King is arrested on July 27 and jailed.
1963
On Good Friday, April 12, King is arrested with Ralph Abernathy by Police Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor for demonstrating without a permit.
On April 13, the Birmingham campaign is launched. This would prove to be the turning point in the war to end segregation in the South.
On May 10, the Birmingham agreement is announced. The stores, restaurants, and schools will be desegregated, hiring of blacks implemented, and charges dropped.
On June 23, MLK leads 125,000 people on a Freedom Walk in Detroit.
The March on Washington held August 28 is the largest civil rights demonstration in history with nearly 250,000 people in attendance.
At the march, King makes his famous I Have a Dream speech.
On January 3, King appears on the cover of Time magazine as its Man of the Year.
King attends the signing ceremony of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 at the White House on July 2.
During the summer, King experiences his first hurtful rejection by black people when he is stoned by Black Muslims in Harlem.
King is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on December 10. Dr. King is the youngest person to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for Peace at age 35.
1965
On February 2, King is arrested in Selma, Alabama during a voting rights demonstration.
After President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act into law, Martin Luther King, Jr. turns to socioeconomic problems.
1966
On January 22, King moves into a Chicago slum tenement to attract attention to the living conditions of the poor.
In June, King and others begin the March Against Fear through the South.
On July 10, King initiates a campaign to end discrimination in housing, employment, and schools in Chicago.
1967
The Supreme Court upholds a conviction of MLK by a Birmingham court for demonstrating without a permit. King spends four days in Birmingham jail.
On November 27, King announces the inception of the Poor People's Campaign focusing on jobs and freedom for the poor of all races.
1968
King announces that the Poor People's Campaign will culminate in a March on Washington demanding a $12 billion Economic Bill of Rights guaranteeing employment to the able-bodied, incomes to those unable to work, and an end to housing discrimination.
Dr. King marches in support of sanitation workers on strike in Memphis, Tennessee.
On March 28, King lead a march that turns violent. This was the first time one of his events had turned violent.
Delivered I've Been to the Mountaintop speech.
At sunset on April 4, Martin Luther King, Jr. is fatally shot while standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.
There are riots and disturbances in 130 American cities. There were twenty thousand arrests.
King's funeral on April 9 is an international event.
Within a week of the assassination, the Open Housing Act is passed by Congress.
1986
On November 2, a national holiday is proclaimed in King's honor.
36 USC 169j -- (United States Code, Title 36 (Patriotic Socieites and Observances), Chapter 9 (National Observances)
Born: January 15, 1929
Died: April 4, 1968
Category: Leader and pacifist
Introduction:
Martin Luther King was an American activist and leader in the African American civil rights movement. He was born in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1929. His minister father combined religion with a sense of social justice. Throughout the southern states in the US, racial segregation was the law- black people were not allowed to go to the same school, live in the same neighborhoods, or even drink from the same water fountains as whites. His loving family protected young Martin from some kinds of racism, and made sure he knew his worth. Still, Martin grew up thinking the worst of whites and it wasn’t until he went to university in the North that he realized that the southern racism was kept alive by its unjust laws which must be changed.
For the next thirteen years, King and others led people across the south, and then across the nation, in non-violent boycotts, sit-ins, marches and demonstrations. As the civil rights movement spread, King raised the hopes and pride of black people.
Explanation:
Martin Luther King, Junior, was the hero of a civil rights movement in the USA. He led many thousands of people in non-violent protests and resistance against racial discrimination. He raised black people’s sense of pride while appealing to the goodness and sense of justice that all people share. He paved the way so that ordinary American citizens did not have to go the extra mile to receive the rights that the 14th amendment had already given them.
Martin Luther is known as a hero worldwide for his work to end racial segregation and for using the non-violent techniques taught by Gandhi.
His eloquent speeches moved both black and white people to join the crusade for civil rights. Together, they faced not only arrest but bombings, shootings, lynchings and beatings by those opposed to integration. Despite such obstacles, blacks still managed to improve their lives and work for change. Martin King, Junior, was part of a rising generation that was better off and better educated. His father had gone from penniless sharecropper’s son to well-educated minister through his own efforts. People like King felt an ever better world was possible for their children, and they were willing to give their lives for that vision.
In 1964, the US Congress passed strong civil rights laws and started to enforce them. Meanwhile, King looked for causes of black powerlessness and poverty. He campaigned for equal education and job opportunities, registration voters, and for a sense of black community pride. He travelled tirelessly, working twenty hours a day, seven days a week.
Always a target for hatred, King was assassinated in 1968. His death seemed like a victory for violence, especially when blacks reacted by rioting in several cities. But King never flinched from the violence he knew lay in everyone, black and white. His dream did not die with him, and today people continue working to realize the community he dreamt of.
As the years passed from the 1950’s to the 1960’s, King’s philosophy was often attacked by extremists, who either thought he was pushing ahead too fast or not fast enough. It took all of his courage to stand clearly behind the principles of love and non-violence. He often reminded his supporters not to hate other people, but only wrong their actions. He firmly believed that all people had goodness in them, and that it could be awakened by taking on their fear and hatred without giving in to it oneself. His philosophy and commitment earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964. At thirty-five, he was the youngest person to ever receive it. This is why I believe that Martin Luther King is the most influential and significant historical figure in the world.
Quote:
‘Being a Negro in America means trying to smile when you want to cry. It means trying to hold on to physical life amid psychological death. It means the pain of watching your children grow up with clouds of inferiority in their mental skies. It means having your legs cut off, and then being condemned for being a cripple. It means seeing your mother and father spiritually murdered by the slings and arrows of daily exploitation, and then being hated for being an orphan’
Artifact:
The Penn Center, an African American cultural centre.
Image:
Historical perspectives:
Many sources reveal the faults and weaknesses of Martin Luther King. One of King’s closest friends, Rev. Ralph Abernathy, wrote a book in 1989 in which he talked about King’s obsession with white prostitutes. King would often use church donations to have drunken sex parties, where he would hire two to three white prostitutes, occasionally beating them brutally. This has also been reported by the FBI agents who monitored King. He was married and had four children while he did this.
Other then the allegations of adultery, there were claims that King had communist connections. In 1962, FBI investigators learned that one of King’s most trusted advisers was New York City lawyer Stanley Levison who had been actively involved with the Communist Party USA. Levison’s influence on King was feared and in 1963, another King Lieutenant, Hunter Pitts O’Dell, was also linked to the Communist Party.
At the time of Martin Luther King, American was deeply entrenched in racism and intolerance of Negroes, especially in the deep southern states. Hatred of King rose from a hatred of African Americans and the perspective of many was that a black man like King should not obtain the power that he did.
Timeline:
Born on at noon on January 15, 1929.
Parents: The Reverend and Mrs. Martin Luther King, Sr.
Home: 501 Auburn Avenue, N.E., Atlanta, Georgia.
Graduated from Booker T. Washington High School and was admitted to Morehouse College at age 15.
Graduates from Morehouse College and enters Crozer Theological Seminary.
Ordained to the Baptist ministry, February 25, 1948, at age 19.
Enters Boston University for graduate studies.
Marries Coretta Scott and settles in Montgomery, Alabama.
Received Doctorate of Philosophy in Systematic Theology from Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts on June 5, 1955.
Dissertation Title: A Comparison of God in the Thinking of Paul Tillich and Henry Wiseman.
Joins the bus boycott after Rosa Parks was arrested on December 1. On December 5, he is elected president of the Montgomery Improvement Association, making him the official spokesman for the boycott.
On November 13, the Supreme Court rules that bus segregation is illegal, ensuring victory for the boycott.
King forms the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to fight segregation and achieve civil rights. On May 17, Dr. King speaks to a crowd of 15,000 in Washington, D.C.
The U.S. Congress passed the first Civil Rights Act since reconstruction. King's first book, Stride Toward Freedom, is published.
On a speaking tour, Martin Luther King, Jr. is nearly killed when stabbed by an assailant in Harlem. Met with President Dwight D. Eisenhower, along with Roy Wilkins, A. Philip Randolph, and Lester Grange on problems affecting black Americans.
Visited India to study Mohandas Gandhi's philosophy of nonviolence.
Resigns from pastoring the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church to concentrate on civil rights full time. He moved to Atlanta to direct the activities of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
Becomes co-pastor with his father at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia.
Lunch counter sit-ins began in Greensboro, North Carolina. In Atlanta, King is arrested during a sit-in waiting to be served at a restaurant. He is sentenced to four months in jail, but after intervention by John Kennedy and Robert Kennedy, he is released.
Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee founded to coordinate protests at Shaw University, Raleigh, North Carolina.
In November, the Interstate Commerce Commission bans segregation in interstate travel due to work of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Freedom Riders.
Congress on Racial Equality (CORE) began first Freedom Ride through the South, in a Greyhound bus, after the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed segregation in interstate transportation.
During the unsuccessful Albany, Georgia movement, King is arrested on July 27 and jailed.
On Good Friday, April 12, King is arrested with Ralph Abernathy by Police Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor for demonstrating without a permit.
On April 13, the Birmingham campaign is launched. This would prove to be the turning point in the war to end segregation in the South.
During the eleven days he spent in jail, MLK writes his famous //Letter from Birmingham Jail//
On May 10, the Birmingham agreement is announced. The stores, restaurants, and schools will be desegregated, hiring of blacks implemented, and charges dropped.
On June 23, MLK leads 125,000 people on a Freedom Walk in Detroit.
The March on Washington held August 28 is the largest civil rights demonstration in history with nearly 250,000 people in attendance.
At the march, King makes his famous I Have a Dream speech.
On November 22, President Kennedy is assassinated.
On January 3, King appears on the cover of Time magazine as its Man of the Year.
King attends the signing ceremony of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 at the White House on July 2.
During the summer, King experiences his first hurtful rejection by black people when he is stoned by Black Muslims in Harlem.
King is awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on December 10. Dr. King is the youngest person to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for Peace at age 35.
On February 2, King is arrested in Selma, Alabama during a voting rights demonstration.
After President Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act into law, Martin Luther King, Jr. turns to socioeconomic problems.
On January 22, King moves into a Chicago slum tenement to attract attention to the living conditions of the poor.
In June, King and others begin the March Against Fear through the South.
On July 10, King initiates a campaign to end discrimination in housing, employment, and schools in Chicago.
The Supreme Court upholds a conviction of MLK by a Birmingham court for demonstrating without a permit. King spends four days in Birmingham jail.
On November 27, King announces the inception of the Poor People's Campaign focusing on jobs and freedom for the poor of all races.
King announces that the Poor People's Campaign will culminate in a March on Washington demanding a $12 billion Economic Bill of Rights guaranteeing employment to the able-bodied, incomes to those unable to work, and an end to housing discrimination.
Dr. King marches in support of sanitation workers on strike in Memphis, Tennessee.
On March 28, King lead a march that turns violent. This was the first time one of his events had turned violent.
Delivered I've Been to the Mountaintop speech.
At sunset on April 4, Martin Luther King, Jr. is fatally shot while standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.
There are riots and disturbances in 130 American cities. There were twenty thousand arrests.
King's funeral on April 9 is an international event.
Within a week of the assassination, the Open Housing Act is passed by Congress.
On November 2, a national holiday is proclaimed in King's honor.
36 USC 169j -- (United States Code, Title 36 (Patriotic Socieites and Observances), Chapter 9 (National Observances)
More information can be obtained here.
Bibliography:
**http://www.africawithin.com/mlking/mlk.jpg**
**http://shoutaboutcarolina.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/chapel-of-ease-st-on-helena.jpg**
**http://www.lib.lsu.edu/hum/mlk/srs216.html**